


though the stars whisper my name (i belong to the sea)

by gooey



Category: One Piece
Genre: Gen, don't let the other strawhats convince you they don't love adventure, luffy has narcolepsy, sanji loves his friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-08 07:22:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8835484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gooey/pseuds/gooey
Summary: How a chef of the sea gets his inspiration: or, Luffy isn't the only romantic on this ship.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first foray into writing fanfiction in years but I'm hopeful. This thing wrote itself tbh but it came out with more introspection and less humor than I intended. As in, "I have no idea what this is classified as". I'd say I nailed the amount of gooey affection that we all know belongs in a good nakamaship though. I've got a long list of further story ideas for one piece so don't think you've seen the last of me!!
> 
> If you wanna talk more one piece hmu at my tumblr: fossilfinding

Sanji considers himself a connoisseur of food.

Naturally, as a chef he prepares and cooks meals that are as magnificent as they are nutritionally balanced. On the Thousand Sunny, though, it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that he is the only one who appreciates the delicate and precise art of cooking (not to say that the beautiful Nami and Robin are uncultured, but their talents, while vital to the wellbeing of the crew in their own different ways, do not lend them the same culinary knowledge that is required to deconstruct a dish to its base components and build it up anew).

Of course, all of his crewmates enjoy his food. Only the best chef for the future pirate king, after all, and Sanji is the best. Sometimes he looks back on his previous skill level- not as a pirate, but as a chef- and he sees how he was beginning to stagnate. A rare ingredient going sour. As much as he loved the Baratie and as much as the old geezer taught him, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that if he had stayed there he would of hit a roof in skill that he never would've recognized, let alone been able to surpass on his own.

Now that he’s on the open seas, though, with only his crew beside him and the All Blue in front of him there’s room for growth on all sides.

What most people think of when they think of a culinary connoisseur is someone who travels around the world eating only the best entrees and the fluffiest pastries. The kind of people who eat at world-renowned restaurants and check off a box next to a number that’s one through five and leave neat and positive review in the newspaper because that’s what is expected of them.

Maybe Sanji was once naive enough to think that way, but now that he’s a Strawhat his vision has been changed irreparably. He has dined with royalty and peasants, friends and enemies, and each one has taught him something new about food or given him a recipe to take with him. Their journey has led them to palaces full of the most decadent food the land had to offer and backwater bars where you’re lucky if the grime they call food isn’t past the expiration date.

It led them to where they are now: a worn down little hole-in-the-wall restaurant that specializes in different kinds of wraps and is so small that Franky couldn’t fit his broad shoulders through the door and Brook took one look at the low ceiling and even lower door frame and elected to wait outside with Franky. The limited space doesn’t stop Luffy and Usopp from clowning around, unfortunately, from where they’ve been drawing doodles and messages in the condensation of the storefront window to the echoing laughter of Brook and Franky outside. Sanji, himself, is really starting to feel the crush of seven people in a restaurant that had a max capacity of four. His eye twitched as the moss-head’s swords dig into his thigh for the third time.

“Oi, watch those pig-stickers,” he growls.

Zoro just smirks like an asshole before he practically hip checks him in the counter he ordered their food from what has to of been almost half an hour ago by now. Not that that Sanji can really blame them; they’re not used to cooking massive amounts of food in a short amount of time like he is.

“Oops,” he says.

Sanji’s attempt to kick him through the door is interrupted by the man behind the counter shoving their food at them in an attempt to get them to leave as soon as possible. Due to the amount, the bags have to be separated out to different people, with him and Zoro carrying the most, Usopp, Chopper, and the ladies carrying two each, and Luffy not being allowed to carry any at all.

They finally all spill out and run down the cobbled road to settle down to sit at the edge of one of the massive white stone tiers that make up this island. These cliffs combined with the fiery leaves on the trees that grow on this autumn island create a spectacular effect. They had arrived at port as the sun was beginning to set and a mutual vote had them deciding to eat out for dinner while they could. So that had led them up a trail of exhausting switchbacks until they reached a cliff that included a sleepy town. They all had been so tired (with the exclusion of Luffy, who Sanji believed had never-ending energy reserves) that they all agreed on Chopper’s pick of the first restaurant they saw.

Luffy skids to a stop precariously close to the ledge with a thousand foot drop, heedless of the fact that there was no guardrail to stop his fall. Not that he was necessarily in any danger of it, but the idiot probably hadn’t factored in the long trail back up, “Food! C’mon, I’ve been waiting forever! Also, I can see the Sunny from here!” Indeed, a closer look at the direction of Luffy’s wildly pointing finger revealed the small figure of the Sunny in the far-off waters below, thrown into shadowy relief by the lamps by the dockside.

Nami all but collapsed onto one of the white boulders littering the edge of the cliff, a place just off the street that brushed the edges of the lights that lined the road. She dropped her bag by her feet and immediately kicked off her heels to rub at her ankle, “Ugh, that was horrible. For a place that relies a lot on tourism they sure like to inconvenience visitors as much as possible.” She tilted her head to look at where Chopper was approaching. “Chopper? Will you please carry me up the next cliff?”

Chopper panted, struggling with his bag, “No way! It was hard enough with just me,” he scowled down at the bag in his hooves, ”And why’s this bag so heavy?” He peeked in and his eyes widened in shocked outrage, “Why am I carrying all the water bottles!” He tipped the bag upside down and the water bottles came spilling out onto the ground.

“I guess you just make the best pack mule,” Brook laughed.

“I’m a reindeer, not a mule!” Chopper shouted.

Robin looked up from where she was trying to save Franky’s wrap from the bag that Luffy had set upon in ravenous consumption, “It was to my understanding that reindeer are known for pulling sleighs, though.”

“Well,” Chopper stuttered. As someone who had indeed pulled a sleigh it’s not like he could refute this claim. “That’s not the same thing at all!”

“So you’re saying be just have to hitch you up, then,” Usopp sniggered from around a mouthful of vegetarian wrap. Chopper proved he still had some energy left when he shrieked in rage and tackled Usopp.

Franky raised an eyebrow from where he was sitting with his back to a rock, “Watch the edge.”

Sanji settled himself next to Robin and extracted his own two wraps- one hot and spicy chicken wrap and the other a creamy avocado and white bean wrap that was supposed to be their most popular choice- before tossing the rest at Luffy.

First, he unwrapped the avocado and white bean wrap. The colors were nice and he noted with approval the use of real chipotles instead of just the powder. When he rolled it back up he was hit with the tangy flavor of the slaw. Could do with some extra onions for crunch, but overall worth the wait. As he finished up the wrap and began unrolling the next one he watched exasperatedly as Luffy slunk over, grabbed at his legs, and placed his chin on Sanji’s knees, looking up at him imploringly.

“No.”

A pathetic whine.

“No way, you already ate more than the rest of us combined.” He pushed his hand against Luffy’s face in an attempt to force him away, but only accomplished squishing his rubbery face into itself, “Beat it, you bottomless pit.”

“But, Sanji,” Luffy mumbled around his hand, “It’s spicy, and it’s meat.” He said it like it was a bulletproof argument as to why Sanji should surrender his food to him. Too bad like all arguments made by Luffy he somehow had a point. Luffy loved spicy food, and was the only one besides himself who would eat it by choice. That also meant that he was the only person Sanji could run spicy recipes by.

Sometimes he wondered if the world was bent to Luffy’s every whim, because for the amount of trouble he landed both himself and his crew in he sure seemed inordinately lucky. He’d never understand how this guy’s mind worked; he doubted there was anyone who truly did, although that pile of moss probably came the closest. Those two shared an animal wavelength that Sanji was happy having no part of. The idea of thinking like Zoro and Luffy was a scary thought.

So he curled his lip but nevertheless picked out a piece of spiced meat and dropped it into his captain’s open mouth. “So how is it?” he asked as he watched Luffy chew.

“‘S good,” he replied as he looked his lips free of any remaining juices and looked back up at Sanji hopefully.

He sighed, “I need more than that. What do you like about it? Do you want me to make them later? Things like that.” He tossed another piece to Luffy and popped some of the chicken into his own mouth. He grimaced, because even if it wasn’t enough for a normal person with no culinary background to detect, he noticed that it was a bit overdone. An ameteur mistake, one he could probably attribute to the crew’s boisterous behavior and the staff’s desire to boot them out as quickly as possible.

Luffy looked like he was actually considering his words so Sanji tossed him another piece to reward good behavior. Positive reinforcement and all that jazz. “It could be spicier,” he states. He isn’t the least bit surprised, Luffy believes everything should be spicer. He wondered if being rubber somehow killed Luffy’s ability to distinguish heat in a dish. With the new facets of personality and unbelievable facts he constantly springs on them, he wouldn’t be surprised. “Oh!” Luffy suddenly crows. “You should take the meat and put it in pasta with the rainbow peppers.” Then he beamed happily up at him for a moment before his eyes lock back onto his dinner again.

Sanji alternates between feeding Luffy and himself strips of chicken as he muses on Luffy’s words. The chicken would lend itself nicely with thicker noodles with a spicy sauce poured over it; combined with the crunchiness of red peppers and sauteed onions he could feel a dish forming in his head. Before he knew it he was out of chicken and was left only with a soggy tortilla, a dilemma that pushed thoughts of next week’s dinner out of his head and brought him back to the present. He gave the tortilla to Luffy- who folded it in half and ate it in two bites- before he crumbled up the wrapper and stuffed it in the bag to be tossed away later.

When Sanji looked back down and saw a hazy look enter his captain’s eyes he quickly leaned forward to catch Luffy before he could collapse onto the rocky ground at his feet. “Thanks,” he whispered to Robin as a hand sprouted from the boulder the two sat on in order to help him maneuver Luffy. They got Luffy situated so his head was in Robin’s lap and his feet in Sanji’s. Robin plucked Luffy’s hat off and placed it on his chest, where his hand immediately rested on it to anchor it down from any passing breeze, so she could start stroking his hair.

“Narcolepsy?” She whispered.

Sanji hadn’t noticed before, but everyone else had quieted down some time ago. He looked around at the others and couldn’t help the warmth that spread through his chest that was completely at odds with the brisk autumn air. Franky was sat with his legs swung over the ledge, gazing out at the view the height of the cliff provided them. Zoro was asleep with his swords across his lap against a particularly craggy boulder, as good as any down-stuffed pillow to him. Chopper was laying across his leg joining him in slumber, a wrapper impaled on his horn that was crackling in the breeze. Nami and Brook were lying on their backs- Nami spread-eagle and Brook with his hands folded over his chest- gazing up at the stars. Above them all, sitting crossed-leg on the highest boulder in their little clearing, sat Usopp with his sketchpad and a pencil.

He sat back against his hands and looked up to address the wide, starry sky above them. “Looks like,” he whispered back, ”But I wouldn’t worry. He’ll be back up chattering our ears off in more time than we wished.” He couldn’t help the fond grin that spread across his face. Luckily the dark cover of night and the shadows thrown by the distant lamps ensured that only the heavens above bore witness to what a sap he was.

“That is his way. Who could sleep long with an adventure on every horizon?”

Sanji’s grin grew wider as he thought of it. Another day of sailing on towards their dreams. Of stumbling upon overlooked restaurants and rare ingredients. Of a never ending journey at the behest of their foolhardy and headstrong captain.

Sanji loved and appreciated the Baratie and those who worked there for everything it did for him, but the thought of returning now seems unbearable. Like forcing himself back into too tight skin; like a butterfly trying to cram itself back in its cocoon. The Sanji of today would be unrecognizable to the Sanji of then, and now he knows that his place in the world unequivocally is here as the chef of the Strawhat pirates, sailing along with his crazy friends and even crazier captain.

“I don’t know any of us that could.”


End file.
